Subtle racism in reporting - Man accused of topping girls lemonade stand and fleeing with $30

[Lancero]

An 18-year-old Riverside man was arrested on suspicion of overturning two teenage girls’ lemonade stand and absconding with their pink and turquoise money box, authorities said Thursday.

Santini Tate walked up to the stand in Rancho Cucamonga about 3:45 p.m. Wednesday and asked the two 13-year-old girls for some lemonade, according to the San Bernardino Sheriff's Department.

Even though he said he did not have cash, the girls gave Tate some lemonade, sheriff’s officials said, and he walked away.

Tate returned a moment later, according to sheriff's officials, and toppled the lemonade stand before snatching the box, which contained about $30.

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-lemonade-stand-theft-20150716-story.html

Reading this, my immediate thought is that it takes a special kind of evil for one to lower themselves to robbing a kids lemonade stand.

But re-reading the article, and remembering past articles detailing crimes committed by 18 year-olds - In some cases, crimes a lot worse - it's not so hard to see the subtle racism the person writing the article went with by labeling a 18 year old black male as a man - Alluding the him being a adult - instead of labeling him a 'teenage male' as in the case in articles about crimes committed by equivalently aged white 18 year olds.

It's interesting really, the subtle differences that newspapers use when reporting crimes involving PoC's.

[DustyJoe]

1. labels

How about just labeling a perp by his actions ?
Gender or orientation, race, ethnicity, religion and facebook status are immaterial

he is just

A bully and a common thief

[4139]

2. No, 18 is a man under the law, not a juvenile/teen...

The reporting is correct... The text did not mention race.

[Igel]

3. It's harder than you think.

You can't lump "newspapers" together any more than you can lump "reporters" or "people" together.

Different papers have different editorial policies.

Or perhaps the paper just leaves the reporters' words, in which case you'd have to compare different articles by the same reporter. Racism would show up as inconsistent pattern in how the policy's applied or enforced--preferably a fairly strong pattern. If AfAm males were "teens" 40% of the time and whites the same age were "men" 55% of the time, that would strike me as probably random unless we're talking hundreds of instances.

Relying on memory is also a problem. We tend to remember things that stick out, that have our attention drawn to them. Claims of "racism" make things stick out. Often such comparisons are based on comparison with a single story that does the opposite but we remember it as being a strong pattern. I've also seen the condemnation go both ways--AfAm males aged 18 called "teens", it was claimed, denied them adulthood and was tantamount to calling a grown man "boy"; calling an 18-year-old AfAm "man" was to deny him the immaturity that young men have. It really depended on whether one wanted to emphasize or minimize dignity and responsibility, so it's not like there's not some perceiver-side manipulation.